Created by Paul Lucraft, Jon Barras, and Paul Seddon.
Optimising Omnichannel Payments: How ERA Group Can Help Businesses Navigate Complexities
In the current retail landscape, customers purchase items via Apps on their mobile phones, in physical stores, online through their laptops, and even with a phone call. Coordinating these different channels consistently is a significant challenge for businesses, but optimising omnichannel payments also presents significant opportunity.
The Complex Landscape of Omnichannel Payments
Managing these various sales channels involves complexities, especially when customers want to return items purchased online to physical stores. For example, if someone buys a dress on ASOS and wants to return it because they don’t like the style or it doesn’t fit, they simply mail it back. However, with retailers like Next or Marks and Spencer’s, customers may prefer to return items in-store for an exchange or refund.
Handling returns is a major challenge. Some clients are seeing over 20% of sold goods returned. This becomes even more complicated when customers buy multiple items and return only a few. The process involves verifying that the returned items match the purchase and ensuring the same customer is recognised both online and in-store.
Online and mobile payments go through gateways, which are third-party secure websites ensuring data security and protecting merchants from handling sensitive customer data directly. This system is different from in-store transactions where payments are processed directly via POS devices. Aligning these systems is crucial for seamless operations but can be quite complex.
We have clients with multiple payment gateways depending on their services, like a leisure company using different systems for hotel bookings, restaurant payments, and holiday park rentals. Helping our clients to manage the integration of these various systems to provide a seamless customer experience and optimise pricing is part of our job. The goal is to create a frictionless purchasing process, recognise returning customers, and ensure systems work seamlessly every time.
Recognising and rewarding loyal customers is another challenge for businesses. For instance, offering discounts to repeat customers requires robust data management systems to track their interactions across all channels.
ERA Group’s Role in Optimising Omnichannel Payments
We’ve assisted leisure companies with booking systems for hotels and holiday parks, and ensuring smooth POS transactions in-resort. We’ve also helped major retailers align their online and in-store sales systems, even for international operations, making returns and customer recognition more efficient.
In another example, we helped a company selling power tools both online and in stores. By re-engineering their processes, we ensured efficient and low-risk delivery of goods, improved their sales ratio, and optimised their fraud and risk settings. This not only safeguarded against fraud but also prevented the loss of legitimate sales.
Adding value for our clients
At ERA Group, we can help with revenue improvement, not just cost reduction. We optimise fraud settings to ensure good business isn’t turned away while maintaining strong fraud controls. We also ensure all parts of the sales process, from order completion to handling disputes, work efficiently and align with customer service requirements.
ERA Group’s expertise in managing these complex systems provides clients with a streamlined, secure, and efficient payment process, enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.
The complexity of omnichannel payments makes it difficult for clients to review themselves. They need specialist input to stay up-to-date with market opportunities, technological and regulatory changes, which is where ERA Group excels. Additionally, we help clients understand the multiple suppliers and embedded systems they use, ensuring seamless integration and cooperation among different stakeholders like finance and marketing.
Even large companies like Barclays or Worldpay face challenges when managing different payment teams. Facilitating understanding of these systems to help enable seamless customer service is what we specialise in. We’ve helped many clients improve their systems and sales while tackling back-office issues. Our vision and understanding of how these systems work is crucial for delivering effective solutions.
For more information on how ERA can help your business navigate the complexities of omnichannel payments, contact us today.
Contact Paul Lucraft
 |
Paul LucraftBanking & Payments SpecialistPhone: 07802 787369 |
Contact Jon Barras
 |
Jon BarrasPayment ServicesPhone: +44 7930 374205 |
Contact Paul Seddon
 |
Paul SeddonProject SpecialistE-mail: [email protected] |